Couple psychotherapy extends the work of the psychotherapist to the patient’s most significant committed adult relationship, yet the therapy is difficult both conceptually and technically. One major reason for this difficulty is that in every couple’s treatment there is a confusing array of psychological defenses as well as regressive and nonregressive couple object relations-as distinct from the object relations that each individual member brings to the couple. Further, many of these processes are occurring outside consciousness and at the very same time. This book is an attempt to clarify all the confusing issues by presenting a three-factor model of couple psychotherapy within a psychodynamic framework. This model has been found to be very effective with many different kinds of couples. The book suggests that there are three powerful couple dynamics that shape every couple’s treatment: (A) the quality and quantity of the couple’s projective identifications; (B) the level of their “couple object relations”; and (C) the presence or absence of the defense of omnipotent control. These three variables are the most important factors in the therapy; they determine the success or failure of every therapy with every couple. These dynamics also determine quite a bit about how to conduct a couple therapy with regard to the therapist’s level of activity, tone, the way of sorting the material in his or her head, and even the kinds of interventions he/she chooses (whether or not, for example, the therapist will use certain resistance techniques). Understanding these three variables and how they interact is key to the success of the therapy.

During the course of psychoanalytic psychotherapy with couples, the practicing clinician is commonly faced with problems and issues that at times can seem nearly insoluble. Integrating the rich ideas and techniques from two psychoanalytic traditions, object relations and relational theory, Object Relations and Relationality in Couple Therapy: Exploring the Middle Ground surveys those problems, reviews the theoretical background for understanding their underlying dynamics, and offers effective and practical solutions for their resolution.

Doug Sprenkle - Awarded the American Family Therapy Academy (AFTA) 2010 Award for Distinguished Contribution to Family Therapy Research and Practice! Grounded in theory, research, and extensive clinical experience, this pragmatic book addresses critical questions of how change occurs in couple and family therapy and how to help clients achieve better results. The authors show that regardless of a clinician's orientation or favored techniques, there are particular therapist attributes, relationship variables, and other factors that make therapy specifically, therapy with couples and families more or less effective. The book explains these common factors in depth and provides hands-on guidance for capitalizing on them in clinical practice and training. User-friendly features include numerous case examples and a reproducible common factors checklist.

This book has been replaced by Clinical Handbook of Couple Therapy, Sixth Edition, edited by Jay L. Lebow and Douglas K. Snyder, ISBN 978-1-4625-5012-8.

Regarded as the authoritative reference and text, this handbook presents the most effective, widely studied approaches to couple therapy. The distinguished coeditors bring together other leading experts, most of whom developed the approaches they describe. Adhering closely to a uniform structure to facilitate study and comparison, chapters cover the history, theoretical and empirical underpinnings, and techniques of each model. The volume also describes cutting-edge applications for particular relationship contexts (such as blended families, LGBT couples, and separated couples) and clinical problems (such as partner aggression, psychological disorders, and medical issues). New to This Edition *Chapters on interpersonal neurobiology and intercultural relationships. *Chapters on couple therapy for PTSD, functional analytic couple therapy, and the integrative problem-centered metaframeworks approach. *Many new authors.*Extensively revised with the latest theory and research. See also Clinical Casebook of Couple Therapy, edited by Alan S. Gurman, which presents in-depth illustrations of treatment.

Counseling Addicted Families, Second Edition, is an up-to-date treatment manual that fosters lasting change for families dealing with addiction and addictive disorders. Focused around the clinically esteemed Sequential Family Addictions Model, the book guides counselors through the principles of how to "progressively sequence" a client family during their change process, and explores how family counseling theories and interventions can be applied in treatment settings. This second edition aligns with the DSM-5 Substance Use Disorder criteria and terminology and includes new sections on neuroscience and cutting-edge drug detection assessment methods. Both experienced and entry-level counselors will appreciate how the Model improves their clinical skills and knowledge to address the idiosyncratic needs of each individual family system and create healthy systemic change.

Brief therapies have become popular-indeed a necessity-in today's managed care environment. Perhaps because it is one of the more complex psychoanalytical models, object relations theory for couples has not been adapted to a short-term model until now. In this volume, James Donovan provides a model for short-term object relations couples therapy, while at the same time offering an easy-to-read primer on object relations that gives the practitioner a step-by-step model replete with examples for using object relations in practice. The goal of this short-term therapy is that couples emerge with an awareness of these internalized object relations and their significance. This book builds on previously successful couples work by advising the therapist to focus on the core, recurring impasse that threatens the couples relationship and stirs old wounds, and gives detailed intervention strategies that focus on the mediation and resolution of the core fight. The five-step model outlines the ways to dismantle the conflict at the levels of the individual and the couple. Donovan integrates aspects of other successful couples therapies into his model in order to broaden its applicability to a greater diversity of treatment situations.